Pop Tarts and Pop Culture References
by Skybluebirdy
Summary: To the world, the Avengers are heroes, all of the time. To the Avengers themselves? They're just a bunch of pretty normal people trying to eke out a life between alien attacks. And that includes playing games, coping with losses, and shopping for pop tarts. Set shortly before Civil War and covers lots of the team-building and everyday things we never got to see, both happy and sad.


**Disclaimer: I own absolutely nothing. As usual. Well, except my undying love for these characters.**

A/N: I've been sitting on this one for a while now, but Endgame really kicked me into polishing it up, because I'm still in hardcore denial, and it's easier to go back to a simpler time when everyone was ALIVE and HAPPY (for the most part). I'm not sure how many chapters there will be, but I have at least a couple more planned. If anyone has any suggestions for everyday Avenger things they'd like to see I'd be happy to at least have a listen. Anyway, happy reading, y'all! =)

* * *

The Avengers were Earth's vaunted "mightiest heroes," and everyone knew it. They were mythic, larger than life. Most of them lived in the new Avengers' compound in upstate New York, but few people knew where it actually was, much less had seen the place, or even been _near it _for that matter. No, the Avengers were a reclusive bunch for a group of super-powered, world-saving individuals.

That didn't stop stories from leaking out though. It seemed every other person in New York had had some kind of interaction with at least one of the Avengers:

"Oh, yeah, that Captain America man stopped those crazy aliens from crashing my shop. Even showed up afterwards to buy a couple of things. Nice guy."

"Stark? When _haven't _I seen that man's face? He's in the papers every week. Took off and landed on that giant building with his flipping name plastered on it every single night. And my cousin _swore_ he crashed her party one time."

"Yeah, yeah, I had a kid stop in for coffee last week. Dropped her cup on the way out and caught it with some freaky colored red glow cloud or somethin'. I hate this city."

The list went on and on. Bottom line, there wasn't a city in the state where the Avengers hadn't been sighted at some point. While some citizens were awestruck and excited (Stark's fan club still has a reputation in Manhattan), many New Yorkers had perhaps been faced with so many aliens and world-ending events by that point that they had simply accepted the fact of superheroes in their midst as a normal circumstance.

Or, rather, they _had _when the heroes had truly lived among them, in the heart of one of their own cities, in Stark's newly rebranded tower. Now, however, the Avengers tended to stick to themselves in their own facility, off the map, where they could train and fight without disturbing the populace, and where they might get a moment of peace from superhero business every once in a while.

After all, the Avengers were still just people, right?

* * *

"Who ordered the ginger wasabi wings?" Steve yelled.

"Whoever it was, I'm kicking them off the team." Tony said, his nose wrinkling in disgust.

Sam put his hand up and Steve slid them down the table. He caught his wings and made a face at Tony. "Just because you can't handle it doesn't mean it's bad, tin can."

"No, but if Tony won't eat it that _is _pretty bad. You've seen his pancakes." Natasha smirked, leaning over Stark to snatch a box of some sort of double spice sriracha wings.

"You're a riot. What, were you class clown of your Russian assassin group?" Stark got a look from Clint for that one, but he ignored it, grabbing a pack of plain, old-fashioned buffalo wings and sliding a little further down the table than usual. Knowing Clint, there would be some form of subtle retribution to be had later.

The rest of the chicken wings were passed around: honey barbecue for Rhodey, lemon pepper for Clint, pineapple teriyaki for Steve (he had some of the strangest tastes of the entire team as he gradually discovered new foods and flavors), roasted garlic for Wanda, and nothing for Vision, who did not, strictly speaking, have to eat (and thus far had not attempted to either), although he enjoyed being with the others as they did so. After everyone had their wings, the triple order of onion rings and fries, as well as various dipping sauces, were arranged sporadically across the table.

It was rare that most of the team was together for dinner. Stark was usually out somewhere else, and both he and Clint had taken a step down in the whole Avenging business since Sokovia and Ultron. Not to mention Thor, who was flitting around the nine realms like he was on some sort of Disney parks tour to find the remaining Infinity Stones. And they still hadn't been able to track down Bruce.

It was, overall, rather difficult to coordinate schedules when everyone was so busy across so many places. Recently, however, Tony had spent more nights in the compound than his house, always shrugging it off when it was brought up. And Clint had _claimed _he was just checking up on everyone, but Natasha had mentioned Laura's relatives were visiting back home.

Whatever their reasons, they seemed to hang out with the group more than usual lately. That didn't mean they all ate together very regularly, many of them preferring to eat leftovers at odd hours or to go out to eat, but, every once in a while, they would all have dinner as a team.

They often ate breakfast in each other's company though, as Cap would put them all to work training immediately afterwards. In this, Natasha's unkind comment about Tony's breakfast skills was, admittedly, deserved, though, in any event, it was not normal for Stark to be relegated to grub duty. That was typically Rhodey's job, as he was one of the few people on the team who could cook with any competency or finesse. He had been trying to teach both Stark and Vision, and Vision, unlike Tony, seemed quite eager to learn, but both of them were what Rhodey curtly termed "challenged."

Vision, to his credit, was more interested in the theoretical side of the activity—the whys and hows of cooking—rather than the application. As such, he rarely dabbled in the actual meals, and his lack of experience coupled with his unfortunate tendency to pick less than amazing recipes for dishes rarely ended well when he did.

Stark was just a mess.

He managed to both burn scrambled eggs and have them still be runny at the same time. Rhodey had just about given up on him, and it was pretty clear to the rest of the team that this had been an ongoing project going back for quite some time.

"Anyone got room for dessert?" Natasha asked, already halfway out of her chair in anticipation of their answers.

"Diet." Steve reminded sternly. Nat gave him a long, slow look, a distinctly irritated expression crossing her face before she finally sat back down.

Tony frowned. "Aw, come on, sour-puss. You don't really think a little ice cream is going to ruin your super-squad, do you? It can't honestly be worse than the fries and wings."

Sam leveled a finger at Tony, jabbing it angrily towards him for emphasis between words as he said, "Stark, I swear, if you get wing night banned I will beat your sorry a—"

A chiming chorus of, "Language!" echoed from both sides of the table, and Steve sighed.

He was, indeed, never going to live that one down. Ever since the... _incident_ at the Hydra base it had been a running joke, with offenders getting progressively more ludicrous Steve impressions from the rest of the team as their transgressions increased.

"Look, the wings are a good source of fuel at least. Your double chocolate fudge bomb ice cream is not." Steve explained once the mockery had subsided.

"Fudge ripple." Tony corrected.

"You know the rules. If we want to work as a team, we need everyone to be able to pull their own weight in a fight. And training's fine, but this diet is here to help with that too."

Nat glanced sidelong at Clint, who looked either incredibly disinterested, or completely unfazed as he polished off one of the baskets of fries, and nodded vaguely at Cap.

"Vision isn't on a diet." Sam groused. Somehow half of his complaints managed to involve Vision these days, the other half involving any other given team member, but usually Steve. For reasons like this diet.

"He also doesn't eat anything, so unless you're planning on following suit, you can suck it up."

"I do not require food in the same way you do, Mr. Wilson. And from what I have observed of this team's behavior, not eating will produce a dramatic drop in team morale." Vision offered in an even tone. This was far from the first exchange he and Sam had had on a variety of equally nonsensical topics.

"This diet is a dramatic drop in team morale." Wanda muttered, and even Rhodey ended up nodding in agreement. Which was actually surprising, because the colonel typically agreed with Steve on team training and conditioning decisions. This diet had stretched everyone's patience to the limit, but there was nothing to do about it. Captain Rogers was unwavering and steadfast when it came to any and all aspects of training.

"All right, that's enough, everyone." Steve said, his tone a warning in and of itself, "You'll get ice cream when I start seeing records broken. I mean it. This team is only as strong as each of you, and when we're out in the field, I need to know you can handle it."

"Well, that was a touching little speech, and I hate to be a party pooper, but, I'm going to go now. Not that it matters. I'm not part of your little _wonder crew_ anymore, so… have fun with that." Tony smiled, the muscles in his face tight and stiff, the gesture as genuine as the faux leather seat cushions they all sat on. Without another word, he left the room, waving vaguely as he went.

Stark was _not_, for the record, technically retired, but it was true that he rarely went on missions with Steve and his newer recruits anymore. It wasn't as if Tony had been demoted, though. By all accounts, including his own, he had ducked out of major hero work of his own volition. But that didn't stop there from being a lot of lingering tension between the two lately, due in no small part to Steve's strict and uncompromising conditioning methods for people that were supposed to be his equals, even though he held himself to those same standards.

No one said anything, but they did worry. There hadn't been any real fights yet, but there had been just enough shouting matches to put everyone on edge. For the most part, they all ignored it, and life went on, with only a few concerning hiccups.

After all, not even the Avengers were perfect.


End file.
